They do grow up, don't they? My little ones outgrew the brooder, so I found a kiddie wading pool at a garage sale for $2!

Below is a picture of the chicks in the wading pool brooder at 3 weeks and 5 days old. I put a circle of 3' chicken wire to help keep them in. There is a red floodlight on a dusk-to-dawn sensor that replaced the heat lamp a week ago, a heated pet bed pad under the pool and this room is insulated and stays about 70 degrees and they seem very happy with it!

I have sold quite a few from my original 50 (25 bantam special, 13 BA and 12 NH) - I am down to a more manageable number - now 5 BAs (4 pullets and a cockerel) and 15 bantams, most of which I think are girls or at least well-behaved boys (the fighters were the first to go, among these fighters were a white silkie , a buff silkie, the only red frizzle cochin , a barred cochin, and the 2 silver seabrights, all of which kept carrying on and picking fights, - not sure if they were just crowded or roosters, but now that they are gone, there is peace and quiet (except 2 of the Japanese bantams - a buff and a black) - anyone in Colorado looking for some of these?

The big awkward reddish chicks in the pic are some of the NH pullets - a lady paid for them and asked me to keep them until they got back from a hunting trip, so I get to feed them for another week.

I paid Ideal Poultry $97 delivered for my 49 chicks (they shipped 51, but 2 of the silkies did not survive the trip), and I have sold 26 of them for $5 each, so I am technically about $33 ahead and I get to keep 23, as long as no one is counting all the money I have spent at the feed store, hardware store and garage sales! Since I got rid of 26, I ordered the 25 pullet SURPRISE SPECIAL from Ideal Poultry (ship date 12/1/10). I figure on picking out my 10 favorites out of them and selling the rest, might wait til spring to sell these and hopefully charge $15 or so when they are almost ready to lay!

I love watching surprise chicks and figuring out what breeds they are!